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Cyberbullies
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ISBN 978-0-615-37366-9
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McCarthy, Linda
Own your space : keep yourself and your stuff safe online / Linda McCarthy.
ISBN 978-0-615-37366-9 (electronic) 1. Computer security. 2. Computers and children. 3. Internet and teenagers.
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Chapter 6
Cyberbullies
Megan Meier, a 13-year-old from Dardenne Prairie, Missouri, met 16-year-old Josh Evans
online at MySpace. In a few short weeks, the two became close friends online, although
they never actually met in person. Josh claimed to have recently moved to the nearby
town of O’Fallon where he was homeschooled and didn’t yet have a phone. Still they
corresponded online often and Megan’s family reported her in good spirits. But after
a few weeks, what began as an online flirtation turned nasty. Josh reported hearing
that Megan wasn’t very nice to her friends. He reposted Megan’s messages without her
permission. Hurtful comments about
Megan were posted online.
Then Josh sent a final
message stating that,
“Everybody in O’Fallon
knows how you are.
You are a bad person
and everybody hates
you… The world
would be a better
place without you.”
Shortly after that,
Megan committed
suicide.
Except where otherwise noted, content in this publication is licensed under the Creative
Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License, available
at http://creative commons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/legalcode
ISBN 978-0-615-37366-9
74 Chapter 6
Megan’s experience was tragic—even more so because Josh Evans didn’t actually
exist. The MySpace account using his name was created by 49-year-old Lori Drew,
the mother of a former friend of Megan’s who lived just four houses away. Prosecu-
tors discovered that the hurtful messages were sent by Drew and her then 18-year-
old temporary employee, Ashley Grills. In addition, Lori Drew was fully aware
that Megan was being treated for depression before she initiated the hoax.
Sadly, Megan is far from the only teen harassed beyond endurance by cyberbul-
lies. Nor is MySpace the only venue for attacks. On January 14, 2010, 15-year-old
Phoebe Prince of South Hadley, Massachusetts committed suicide after a year of
cyber attacks via text message and Facebook by a group of girls at her school. If
you think only girls are targeted by cyberbullies, think again. Boys are also at risk,
as was evidenced by the suicide of 13-year-old Ryan Patrick Halligan of Vermont,
who had suffered months of cyberattacks by bullies questioning his sexual orienta-
tion. In 2008, a 16-year-old Brighton boy barely survived a suicide attempt follow-
ing an extended “relationship” with what turned out to be a fictitious boy named
Callum on the networking site Bebo.
What all of these teens had in common was a vulnerability to betrayal and humili-
ation from online Friends who weren’t what they appeared to be.
Cyberbullying isn’t limited to computers either. It can also include sending harass-
ing text messages and inappropriate photos via cell phone. Sometimes, kids upload
those texts from cell phones to websites, expanding their audience and furthering
the damage.
Cyberbullying can take many forms. Some bullies attack by sending insulting or
threatening emails or cell phone text messages. Others attack on social networking
sites by creating hate groups. A few attack in multiple formats at the same time,
leaving their victims feeling constantly under siege. One teen reported being bul-
lied by an ex-boyfriend on Facebook, MySpace,
and Bebo, by email, on Twitter, in YouTube
I hate u everyone hates u…
videos she didn’t authorize, and even through u should just die.
text messages. Eventually, she was afraid to —Anonymous posting to a teen’s
turn on her computer or answer her phone. website
How bad is it? Over half of middle-schoolers have been bullied online at least
once. And just about every teen we talk to either knows someone who has been
bullied, or has been bullied themselves.
Clearly, the Jeremy hate group was an incidence of cyberbullying. How can we
tell? First, there’s the obvious “I hate” naming scheme. Another clue is that the
administrators and nearly all members of the group attended the same high school.
Interestingly, the Profiles of Jeremy’s haters seemed especially lame. Jeremy, on the
other hand, seems to be an intelligent, well-behaved kid. In twenty years, those
cyberbullies may very well be bringing Jeremy’s coffee or flipping his burgers. Of
course, that won’t affect how badly Jeremy may feel today.
Cyberbullies 77
Technically, of course, hate groups aren’t allowed. Virtually all social network-
ing sites explicitly ban this type of group. The Jeremy hate group actually violates
three of the Facebook terms of usage where users agree not to harass other users,
not to post content that is hateful, and not to encourage others to violate the terms
of usage.
The downside to Googling is that it doesn’t work well for people with incred-
ibly common names. John Smith returns 100,000,000 search results. Unless your
given name or surname is incredibly uncommon, the chances are that you’ll need
to search for more than just your name. The plus side is that if your name is that
common, no one is going to assume that the John Smith registered as an aspiring
neo-Nazi is really you and not some other John Smith.
If your name is fairly common, you’ll want to search for your name AND city or
your name AND phone number, etc. Also search for your email address.
Your first response should be to complain directly to the site on which you found
information damaging to your reputation. Most sites promptly remove any post-
ings that might be construed as harassment.
that just FINDS the nasty stuff about you. Actually removing that information
costs upwards of $30 per item.
While you’re notifying professionals, don’t forget to notify law enforcement profes-
sionals if appropriate. Otherwise, you could end up with the same problem as this
teen who posted to Ask.com on Yahoo!
When the “MySpace Mom Suicide” story broke, public attention was immediately
focused on the issue of cyberbullying. Since then, the case has served to illustrate
the difficulties of legally protecting kids from online harassment, even blatantly
harmful harassment as in this case. Initial public reaction to Megan’s suicide was
followed within a year by criminal prosecution. In November 2008, 49-year-old
Lori Drew was convicted in what legal experts consider the first official prosecu-
tion of cyberbullying. That conviction was based on Drew having violated the
MySpace terms of service which require users to provide factual information about
themselves, and to agree not to use the service “to harass or harm other people.”
In July 2009, however, that conviction was overturned on the grounds that the
Cyberbullies 81
parties involved never actually read the terms of service before clicking the button
to agree to them. (We discussed earlier how malware writers count on users not
reading EULAs in order to “legally” dump unwanted adware. Apparently, cyber-
bullies are also protected by users agreeing to terms they haven’t read.)
The Drew case also led to the introduction of the Megan Meier Cyberbullying Pre-
vention Act. However, as of 2009 that bill was stalled in committee. Several media
outlets reported serious problems with First Amendment Rights in the proposed
bill. That’s likely to remain an issue with any laws regarding cyberbullying. It’s
nearly impossible to protect Free Speech, as our society strives to do, without at
least sometimes protecting hateful speech as well.
So what can you do to help? If you know about a cyberbullying incident at school,
report the abuse—even if it’s not you being targeted. Make it a personal crusade
not to tolerate cyberbullying. Remember, a crusade can be started by anyone,
anywhere. After Megan Meier’s suicide, a group of teens began a crusade to stop
cyberbullying as a way to honor Megan’s memory. They created Megan’s Pledge,
a commitment by teens to work against cyberbullying. Consider involving your
school in their crusade.
What else can you do to protect yourself and your friends from cyberbullies? Be
vigilant and mind the top ten steps to prevent cyberbullying:
1. Know your Friends. Some teens put themselves and their information at risk
by accepting people they don’t actually know as online Friends. They seem to
believe that everybody does this. That’s not true. A 2008 study of teen social
networking site users by University of California researchers found that only
5% of teens had online friends they didn’t actually know offline. So feel more
comfortable next time you Ignore a Friend request from someone you don’t
recognize.
2. Sign Megan’s Pledge and encourage your school to have every student sign the
pledge. Don’t forget that cyberbullying attacks are successful because other
kids hop on board and become attackers rather than rallying against the at-
tackers. You can download the pledge kit from stopcyberbullying.org.
82 Chapter 6
3. Limit the information you post. Never include personally identifying data
like your home address or phone number. This can protect you from identity
assault.
4. Set your Privacy settings carefully. Social networking sites now allow you to
designate privacy settings on virtually everything you post—status updates,
photos, group memberships—as you make those postings. Carefully consider
how public you want to be about your private life. Don’t think just because
you set your page to private that it cannot be accessed.
5. Know what your Friends post about you—in photos as well as in words. Your
friends may not be as concerned with protecting your privacy as you are.
6. Trust your instincts. If a new Friend begins to creep you out, unFriend them.
Fast.
7. Think before you click. Don’t forget that you can’t take something back once
you hit send or post. If you’re not sure whether something’s appropriate, it’s
probably not. Be especially careful about posting anything when you’re mad
or upset. If you find yourself seething about something you’ve read online,
take a break away from your computer before you respond.
8. Report abuse. Actions online can do more than hurt. Reporting abuse might
even prevent a suicide. How would you feel if you knew and DIDN’T say
anything? Is that something you want to carry around with you for the rest
of your life?
9. Don’t bully yourself. Think carefully before each and every post. Too much
online reputation damage is self-inflected when people post first and think
later.
10. Don’t bully others. Treating others the way you want to be treated is never
a bad decision. It will also protect you from cyber attacks in retribution.
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